Hyeonho likewise kept his eyes forward, scanning the flowering trees lining the street. Huiwon gave him a brief sideways glance and said nothing in return.
“Oh, it must be south-facing here — quite a few flowers have bloomed already.”
When they entered a certain stretch of road, several flowering trees had burst into full, lush bloom, showing off their magnificent forms. Even over that short span, people had gathered in clusters, snapping photos, and a few food trucks were parked along the roadside. Traffic naturally began to slow.
Hyeonho watched the people around him, each in their own little pocket of happiness, then glanced sideways at Huiwon. Huiwon had his head tilted, looking up at the flowering trees through the car window — and had been for quite a while.
“Want to park nearby and look at the flowers for a bit?”
“……No.”
The no came slowly. Hyeonho decided to try a different angle.
“I want some of those grilled chicken skewers they’re selling over there. Let’s park and grab a few.”
“…….”
“You don’t actually see places selling chicken skewers that often, you know? Since I’m the one suggesting it, I’ll pay. Just eat one with me.”
Huiwon didn’t say anything to this offer. He just cast his eyes downward and puffed one cheek out with air. Hyeonho saw this and let the corner of his mouth curl upward. It was as good as a silent yes. However junior Hyeonho might be at the precinct, he was still a detective in the Violent Crimes Unit.
Spend enough time reading people, and you start picking up their habits and tendencies almost as a professional reflex — and Huiwon was easier to read than most. He was remarkably legible.
From what little Hyeonho had observed, Huiwon always seemed to need a reason. Nothing elaborate — just give him a few reasons, and he wouldn’t refuse outright.
Hyeonho deliberately parked a little farther away. The weather was mild and the flowers were beautiful, and now that they’d come all this way he wanted to walk a bit — but Do Huiwon, walking right beside him, was absolutely not the type to stroll along at a leisurely pace, so he’d had no choice but to use the parking as an excuse. Hyeonho casually grumbled about how hard it was to find a spot, and Huiwon unbuckled his seatbelt without any particular suspicion.
The two of them walked slowly toward where the food trucks were. With so many people around, they couldn’t move fast and had to match the crowd’s pace. Huiwon’s head moved busily left and right.
They didn’t stop until they reached a food truck settled beneath a large cherry blossom tree. Hyeonho, already full, felt no particular excitement at the sight of the chicken skewers sizzling and crackling as they cooked — but Huiwon was a different story. His eyes lit up like someone who hadn’t eaten dinner, and in no time at all he was reaching for his fourth skewer. For someone his size, the amount he put away was impressive. Even the food truck owner, watching him, remarked that he had a wonderfully healthy appetite.
“What are you looking at?”
Huiwon tore the last piece of chicken off the long skewer with his teeth and shot Hyeonho a look. He was every bit as sharp as the skewer in his hand.
“……Ah. I just had a thought — so this is why people watch mukbang.”
Genuinely. Hyeonho had never been able to understand why anyone would watch mukbang content, but watching Huiwon, he was starting to get it. Watching those round cheeks working as he chewed and swallowed cleanly made Hyeonho’s own appetite stir. Without having planned to, he ended up eating two skewers following Huiwon’s lead, while Huiwon finished at five. And even then Huiwon seemed reluctant to be done, clicking his tongue wistfully — so Hyeonho asked, “Want me to get some to take home?” — to which Huiwon said no, he didn’t want that either.
After paying for the skewers, Hyeonho and Huiwon started walking back toward where they’d parked.
“I love spring. Maybe it’s because of all the colors — it really feels like being alive, you know?”
“…….”
“The magnolias blooming white like that, the forsythia all bright yellow, and the cherry blossoms and azaleas — they’re both pink but completely different shades.”
Having said so, Hyeonho, savoring a rare moment of peaceful ease, pulled out his phone and started taking photos here and there. He took photos of the cherry blossoms in full bloom, and the forsythia along the roadside. Turning his body this way and that with his phone raised, he eventually found his focus on Huiwon, who was standing still and looking up at the cherry blossom tree.
It happened to suit him perfectly — Huiwon standing under the cherry blossoms in a pale pink t-shirt and jeans. Hyeonho smiled and click, took a photo. Since he was using the default camera, he’d expected Huiwon to notice the sound and say something, but luckily it was swallowed up by the noise around them, and Huiwon didn’t realize he’d been photographed.
I’ll send it to him when we get home. Imagining Huiwon throwing a fit made him laugh. Ah, this is a problem — I keep apologizing and then turning right around and poking at him again. Still, the photo had turned out well, so maybe keeping one copy would make Huiwon glad too, in the end.
Hyeonho and Huiwon got back in the car. As they made their way onto the main road, Huiwon pressed his temple against the window and started dozing. With a full stomach and warm weather, it was only natural that sleep would come.
“Sleep comfortably. Eating a lot always makes you drowsy.”
“It’s not because I ate a lot — I just haven’t slept well the past few days.”
I’m not a glutton.
The voice that shot back had no energy in it. His eyes kept trying to open but seemed to be losing the battle. Hyeonho glanced at him out of the corner of his eye and let out a soft laugh.
“I know. It must be rough not sleeping for a few days — get some rest. It’ll take a while to get there. Traffic’s bad too.”
Huiwon seemed to want to say something back, but sleep apparently won out — his head drooped and he was out.
The brief sleep was genuinely sweet. When a hand shaking his shoulder woke him, the first thing Huiwon saw was the familiar alley of his neighborhood, and the second thing was a soft blanket draped over his body. He stared blankly down at it with a still-half-asleep face, and Hyeonho, reading his expression, explained.
“You were curled up like you were cold. I have a blanket in the car since I end up spending nights in it pretty often.”
The blanket was yellow with some character printed on it — something that looked either like a lion or a bear, whatever was fashionable these days. Huiwon pushed it aside and unbuckled his seatbelt.
“I’ll head in.”
“You were drooling in your sleep — go get home and rest properly.”
At Hyeonho’s perfectly even-toned delivery, Huiwon froze with his hand on the passenger door and immediately scrubbed at the corner of his mouth. Even if he hadn’t slept well in days, the fact that he’d slept that deeply — like he was in his own bed at home — was mortifying enough to make his ears burn hot.
“I was joking.”
Hyeonho’s voice came through, laced with laughter. A vein appeared on Huiwon’s forehead.
This guy, seriously. Huiwon snapped his head around and fixed Kang Hyeonho with the full force of his glare. He opened his mouth, ready to unleash a string of insults — then closed it again in a firm line, deciding he didn’t want to waste his energy or his time on a back-and-forth.
Instead, Huiwon let his face do the talking — pure, pointed fury — then wrenched the passenger door open and slammed it shut with a bang that said everything his words hadn’t. The anger had his shoulders heaving and his fists trembling.
The moment Huiwon got inside his apartment, he went straight to the bathroom and splashed cold water on his face. Being mocked like that stung. Kang Hyeonho has a way of getting under your skin.
He’s clearly the one being rude — so why do I always end up feeling like I’m the one who got played? Huiwon ground his back teeth together and splashed cold water on his face again.
He washed until his face went numb, and the indignation settled somewhat. Huiwon dried his face with a towel and, out of habit, picked up his phone to set an alarm.
A message notification from Kang Hyeonho was on the screen.
He tapped it open with his thumb. The cluster of photos was the flowers Hyeonho had been snapping on his own along the street. Keep it to yourself — taking pictures and then sending them too, the nerve.
Huiwon was swiping through the cherry blossom and forsythia photos with mild disinterest when he stopped.
The last photo was of him, standing beneath the cherry blossom tree.
Is this guy insane. Who gave you the right to photograph someone without their permission. The calm he’d managed to rebuild moments ago started to bubble and churn again.
— Are you out of your mind? Who gave you permission to take that?
He was about to send a follow-up crammed with expletives when a message from Hyeonho arrived first, making him pause.
[You looked pretty, so I took it.]
The text read as shamelessly smug as ever. Huiwon was still thinking about how to fire something back when another message came from Kang Hyeonho.
[The flowers must have gotten a lot of sun — they came out beautifully.]
[Sleep well.]
Huiwon simply threw his phone onto the bed.
